A Christmas carol

• Industrial Revolution


  Time of immense change between 1760-1840, change from farming to factories, increasing number of factories built, London changed from rural to industrial state
• Industrial Revolution


  • Positive effects: more job opportunity, increased production, efficiency, migration
  • Negative effects: class divide exacerbated, lower classes subject to dangerous and dehumanising conditions, long and hard hours, even children as young as 4 or 5 forced to work
• Dickens is critical of the industrial revolution and the overzealousness (obsessiveness) of money that was a by-product of the revolution
• Dickens was extremely empathetic towards the poor and their suffering
• Dickens grew up in poverty and first hand experienced the mistreatment and exploitation of the poor
• Dickens was passionate about giving the poor a voice through his fictional novellas
• Dickens was a social critic who understood that the poor were mistreated not because of laziness, but because of the abuse of authoritarian powers (such as the government)
• A Christmas Carol was written by Dickens in response to the Report of Children's Employment Commission which covered the dehumanising and exploitative conditions children were subject too in the Victorian era
• Dickens first wrote a pamphlet to try and spread awareness about the plight of the poor, then turned this into a novella as he was aware that his fictional tales would galvanise more support for the poor as it would reach a larger readership
• The Cratchits and Tiny Tim's death are characters Dickens has constructed to carry this message about the exploitation of the poor
• Dickens debunks the commonly help stereotype that the poor were lazy through the Cratchits
• Dickens highlights how compassion towards the plight of the poor will solve poverty, not punishing the poor
• Thomas Malthus


  Influential British economist who believed that poverty was an inevitable consequence to the increasing population, famine and poverty were unavoidable as food demand could not be met
• Dickens' political diatribe (criticism of the politics at the time) can be seen as an anti- Malthusian tale
• In 1834 The New Poor Law was introduced which caused the introduction of the workhouses
• The poor were sent to workhouses, which were intended to be there to provide shelter and food for the poor in exchange for work
• In practice, the workhouses were hubs of squalor which exploited the poor, splitting up families and making young children work in these belligerent conditions
• It was estimated that 145,000 people died each year working in the workhouses and around 10% of people admitted to the workhouses, would die, including young children as young as 4 or 5
• Dickens himself was put into a workhouse when his father was sent to debtors prison, meaning he was put into a workhouse in which he was separated from his family
• Dickens condemned the dehumanising laws put in place for the poor such as 'The Poor Law'
• Victorian society was extremely religious, and its foundations were built on these very beliefs
• Redemption


  Instrumental in Christianity, with the belief that God provides individuals with redemption when sin has been confessed
• Salvation


  The most poignant example being the salvation of mankind from Jesus due to his resurrection
• The 7 deadly sins


  • Pride (ego)
  • Greed (want for materialism or want for more)
  • Lust (strong sexual desire)
  • Envy (jealousy)
  • Gluttony (want for God's will, creating distance between a person and it, and creating distance between a person and God)
• Redemption and salvation is pivotal in Scrooge's transformation
• Scrooge at the beginning of the novella embodies the 7 deadly sins of greed, wrath and pride
• Motif of light


  Symbolises hope and enlightenment throughout the novella
• The motif of light is a direct juxtaposition with the surrounding semantic field of darkness and cold surrounding Scrooge in stave 1


  Highlights how Scrooge thrived in being misanthropic and cold-hearted
• Fred


  • Magnanimous (generous), model Christian, sincere, optimistic, jovial
• Fred is foil to Scrooge

  He emphasises Scrooge's miserly and inconsiderate qualities
• Fred's optimistic and jovial attitude is shown through his abundance of exclamative sentences
• Fred's religious and jovial words juxtapose Scrooge's pessimistic words surrounding death
• Dickens constructs Fred to exacerbate how Scrooge's characteristics (parsimonious, misanthropic, miserly and pessimistic) are not desirable traits for society
• Fred's elation is described hyperbolically, even in the way he is "twisting his face into the most extravagant contortions"
• As Fred is "blest in laugh", it alludes to how Fred's energy is infectious as God has blessed him with benevolence and joy
• Dickens uses Fred to be an exemplary model of the perfect citizen, compassionate, empathetic, and religious, to show the reader how social reform will be easier if everybody in society was more alike to Fred and less like Scrooge
• Fred's presence allows the reader a character to measure Scrooge's redemption against
• As Fred is the epitome of a moral citizen, when Scrooge becomes alike to him at the end, this is confirmation that Scrooge has become societies paradigm (model-example) of a moral member of society
• Scrooge dismisses the idea of Marley being due to food poisoning as puts his vision of Marley as "A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats"
• Scrooge is horrified through the gothic supernatural presentation of Marley: "Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands before his face"